Chapter 3. Dick & Co. Driven Up A Tree

________________________________________________
_ CHAPTER III. DICK & CO. DRIVEN UP A TREE

"Dick!"

"Yes?" replied Prescott, turning and looking back at Tom, whose turn it now was to furnish motive power to the loaded cart.

"How far did you say it was from Gridley to the second lake?" asked Reade.

"Sixteen miles."

"I've pushed the cart more than that far already," grunted Tom. "I'm willing to wager that the lake is more than a hundred and twenty miles from Gridley."

"Suppose it is," scoffed Dave, falling back beside the cart "Tom, just think of the fine training your back muscles are getting out of this work!"

"I'll tell you all about that, Darry," grumbled Reade, "when you've had your turn for ten minutes. How much longer does my turn run, Dick?"

"Five minutes," replied Prescott, after glancing at his watch. "Are you going to be able to hold out that long?"

"Yes; if I live that long," sighed Tom.

Dick and Hazelton had each taken their fifteen minute turns at pushing the cart. The boys had already put some distance between themselves and Gridley. Dick & Co. were tramping down a well-shaded road bounded by prosperous-looking farms. Two miles further on the boys would branch off through a long stretch of woods where the road was rougher. Here two youngsters would be needed for the work, one pushing, while the other hauled on a rope made fast to the front of the cart.

Five of the boys were well laden with miscellaneous packages of food. Tom, on account of pushing the cart, had been permitted to place his load on the already well-packed cart.

"Time's up," called Dick. "Dave to the bat."

Smiling, Darry packed his own parcels in the cart.

"Whew! But it's good to get away from that thing," grunted Reade, mopping his forehead, as he stalked on ahead.

"Here, you, Tom!" called Danny Grin. "Take your personal pack off the cart and tote it like the rest of us."

Reade turned a comically scowling face to Dalzell.

"Danny," he demanded rebukingly, "why couldn't you hold your tongue?"

"Because, when I'm working hard, I don't like to see you shirk," replied Dalzell with a complacent grin.

"But consider Darry," urged Reade. "Note how strong, lithe and supple he is. Boy, he is much better fitted for pushing my personal pack on the cart than I am for carrying it."

"Stick a pin in the chat, Tom," advised Darrin briefly, "and take your truck off the cart. I want to begin enjoying myself."

"I'd carry twice as much as I have to, just for the sheer joy of hearing you kick like a Texas maverick by the time you've had the cart handles for two minutes," laughed Tom, as he took his own parcels off the cart. "Now, David, little giant, let us see you buckle down to your task---like a real or imitation man!"

Darry braced himself, gave a hitch, then started forward briskly.

"Get out of the way, you loiterers!" called Dave, overtaking Tom and Greg and shoving the front end of the cart against them. "Don't block the road!"

"That's what comes of hitching an express engine to a freight load," grunted Reade, as he made for the side of the road, brushing his clothes.

There was bound to be a lot of "kicking" over the work of handling the push cart, but Dick & Co. were in high spirits this hot July morning.

Weeks before, when first planning this trip, all had begun to "save up" toward outfits of khaki, leggings and all, and blue flannel shirts. These khaki clothes made the most serviceable of all camping costumes.

"I begin to feel like a soldier," laughed Dick contentedly.

"So do I," agreed Tom Reade. "I feel like a poor dub of a soldier who has been sent to march across a continent on the line of the equator. I believe eggs would cook in any of my pockets!"

"Cut out all the grumbling and the discomfort talk," warned Dave Darrin.

"Well, I don't know that I need to grumble, if you can feel contented behind that old cart," laughed Reade. "How does it go, Darry?"

"I haven't begun to notice, as yet," replied Dave coolly.

Tom eyed him suspiciously.

"Darry," he remarked presently, "you're talented."

"In what way?" Dave inquired.

"You're one of the most talented fibbers I ever encountered. You've been pushing that cart all of four minutes, and you pretend that you don't notice the work."

"I expected to work when I left home," Darrin informed him. "If I hadn't felt that I could endure a little fatigue, then I'd have remained at home and looked for a job sleeping in a mattress factory's show-room."

Tom subsided after that. Dave's fifteen minutes were up presently, but he declined to accept relief at the push cart until they reached the point where their road branched off on to the rougher highway. Now, Greg and Hazelton took the cart, Greg at the handles, Hazelton pulling ahead on the rope.

Thus they went along, for some five minutes, when Dick, who was in the lead, reached a small covered bridge over a noisy, rushing creek.

Just as Dick gained the entrance to the bridge his gaze fell upon a large white sheet of paper tacked there. The word "Notice," written in printing characters, stared him in the face.

Dick read, then called back quietly:

"Halt! Here's something we've got to look into at once."

The cart handlers willingly enough dropped their burden. All hands crowded forward to read what was written underneath on the sheet of paper. It ran thus:

"All passers-by are cautioned that a mad dog, frothing at the mouth, has passed this way, going west. Officers have gone in pursuit of the animal, but passers-by may encounter the dog before the officers do. The dog is a huge English mastiff, without collar. Turn back unless armed!"

"Fine and cheery!" exclaimed Tom Reade, looking rather startled despite his light comment.

"And, just as it happens, this is the only road in the country that we want to use just at present," commented Dick Prescott.

"Shall we go ahead, keeping a sharp lookout?" asked Dave.

"I don't know," Dick muttered. "We'll have to think that over a bit."

"There are six of us, and we can cut good, stout clubs before we proceed farther," suggested Greg Holmes.

"Yes, and probably, if attacked, we could finish the dog," Dick went on. "Yet, most likely, before we did kill the brute, he'd have bitten at least one of us."

"I'll go on, if the rest of you fellows want to," observed Danny Grin. "At the same time, it looks like taking a big chance, doesn't it?"

"It's taking a chance, of course," Dick admitted. "The dog may be running yet, and we might never get within ten, or even twenty, miles of him. Or, the officers may have caught and killed the brute by this time. Or, the mastiff might bound at us from the woods at any moment now."

"Whether we go back or keep on, we're fairly likely to meet the mad dog," suggested Tom. "Mr. Chairman, I rise to move, sir, that we cut clubs at once, and do the rest of our talking afterwards!"

"The motion is seconded and carried," called Dick, darting into the woods. "Come on and find the clubs."

Less than forty seconds afterwards each of the six boys was cutting a stout sapling, which he forthwith trimmed.

"I believe I could kill anything but an ox with this," observed Reade, eyeing his bludgeon.

"Look out!" called Danny Grin, as if in alarm.

In a twinkling Tom dropped his club, dashed at a young oak tree and began to climb, thinking that the dog had suddenly appeared.

"Stop that nonsense, Dan---and everyone of you!" called Dick sharply. "Let no one knowingly give any false alarms, or we might disregard a real warning when it comes."

Tom sheepishly dropped to the ground, picked up his cudgel, then gazed at Dalzell with a look that had "daggers" in it.

"I'll owe you one for that, Danny Grin," Reade remarked, "and I'm always careful about paying my debts."

"Now that we have our clubs," suggested Dick, "let's get back to the road and discuss what we're going to do."

"Surely," hinted Dave, "we can find some other road and keep on our way."

"Undoubtedly," Greg nodded. "But the mad dog might cross through the woods and be found waiting for us on that other road. Or, he may now be headed for the second lake, or even be there now."

"Let's vote on what we're going to do," urged Hazelton. "Dick, what do you say?"

"I don't know what to say," their young leader answered. "I don't like to see our party cheated out of our vacation. Neither do I care to take too many chances of having our vacation changed into a tragedy. I've never had hydrophobia, but I've a strong notion that it wouldn't be pleasant. I know just how you fellows feel. You hate to lose your fun."

"We do hate to lose our fun," agreed Darry.

"And yet you don't want to have an encounter with a dog that has hydrophobia."

"We don't," approved Tom Reade. "Dick, you have a truly wonderful intellect when it comes to successful guessing."

"There's a cloud of dust up the road to the west," discovered Greg Holmes.

In an instant all eyes were turned that way.

"Can that be the dog?" asked Darry. "Something is traveling this way and stirring up a lot of dust."

Whatever the moving object was, it appeared to be half a mile away up the straight, dust-covered road.

"Until we find out what it is," Dick suggested, "I believe that tree climbing will prove healthful exercise."

Quickly they moved the push cart a little to one side of the road. Then they ran for trees, but every member of Dick & Co. retained his hold on his bludgeon.

The dust cloud was coming nearer. From the elevation of his perch in a tree Dick soon discovered and announced:

"It's a horse and wagon coming this way."

"Maybe it's the officers returning from the hunt," suggested Reade, who was on a lower limb of the next tree.

"There's only one man in the wagon, and he's whipping up the horse," Dick announced.

"There are good enough reasons for the man wanting his horse to hurry," chuckled Danny.

"Maybe the dog is in pursuit now," hinted Darrin.

Dick, who had the best view of the road to the westward, peered carefully.

"I don't see anything to suggest a pursuing dog," Prescott made answer. "If the dog is near, he must be running under the trees along the side of the road."

Greg climbed up beside his leader.

"Why, that man has stopped whipping the horse," young Holmes declared. "And is lighting his pipe. That doesn't look as though he were very much scared about anything."

"We'll stay where we are until we've talked with the man," Dick decided.

Just before reaching the other end of the covered bridge the driver, a farmer, and with what looked like a light load of farm produce in the body of the wagon, slowed his horse down to a walk, at which gait he drove over the bridge. Then, sighting the boys up in the trees, and each with a club, he reined up.

"Hello, boys!" he called drawlingly. "Who's been a-chasing you? What scared you?"

"Read that notice, sir, tacked up at the bridge entrance," urged Dick.

Alighting, and drawing a pair of spectacles from a vest pocket, the farmer complied.

"Mad dog, eh?" he drawled. "Sho!"

"Did you see anything of the brute?" called Darry.

"No; I didn't," answered the farmer. "Don't believe there is any mad dog along the way, either. I've reined up and talked with neighbors during the last hour and a half along the way. They didn't mention nothin' 'bout any peevish dogs. Now, it stands to reason that the officers would have stopped and warned folks along the road, don't it? And the neighbors would have passed the gossip with me, wouldn't they?"

"Didn't you see any officers coming from this way?" asked Dick.

"Nary one," rejoined the farmer. "Only fellers that passed me, coming from this direction, was two young dudes---I sh'd say about your ages. They was in a high-toned speed wagon-----"

"Automobile?" asked Reade.

"Said so, didn't I?" drawled the farmer. "Them dudes looked mighty tickled about something. They was laughin' a whole lot and looked mighty well pleased with themselves. Do you reckon they was any friends of your'n, trying to have fun with you?"

"I can't recall any friends who would try to put up such a pleasant surprise for us," said Dick dryly, as he slipped down to the ground. "What did the fellows in the automobile look like, sir?"

That farmer possessed well-developed powers of observation, as was proved by the minute descriptions he gave of the two young men.

Dick's chums, who had now joined him at the roadside, looked puzzled. Then light dawned in Tom's eyes.

"Jupiter!" cried Reade. "If it weren't that they're not in this part of the country, I'd say that the pair were Dodge and Bayliss!"

"How do you know they're not in this part of the country?" asked Prescott dryly. Then, of the farmer, he further inquired:

"What kind of a car were they driving, sir?"

"A red Smattach, last year's model," answered the man.

"That's just what the Dodge automobile runabout is, and Smattach cars are not common in this section," muttered Prescott. Then he went over to take a keener look at the written notice on the sheet of white paper.

"This looks like disguised handwriting; it's backhanded," Dick mused aloud. "But I notice one thing peculiar. Who makes a funny little quirl at the beginning of a letter 'm,' such as you see in this writing?"

"Bert Dodge!" flashed Dave Darrin, an indignant light flashing in his eyes. "So we're six simpletons, held up by his shady tricks, are we? If Bert Dodge is anywhere ahead of us on the road, then I hope we have the good luck to meet him under conditions where he can't jam on the speed and get away from us!"

"Joke on you all, is it?" asked the farmer, grinning quizzically.

"It looks like it," admitted Dick sheepishly. "You're sure that none of the folks west of here heard anything of a mad dog, are you?"

"Pretty sure," nodded the farmer.

"Then this notice isn't really needed up here," replied Dick, carefully pulling the tacks, after which he folded the paper and tucked it in one of his pockets. "We're mightily obliged to you, sir."

"Oh, you're welcome," grinned the farmer, as he gathered up the reins over his horse. "I've got to be getting along. I'm late in Gridley now."

"If that man is too talkative in Gridley, folks will hear how we got sold," yawned Tom, gazing after the farm wagon. "Then---my! Won't folks be laughing at us?"

"It's a mean trick," cried Dave indignantly. "I wish I had that Dodge fellow here, right now! I believe that I'm master of enough English to convey to him an idea of just what I think of him!"

"I wouldn't waste any of my carefully acquired English on him," growled Tom Reade.

"What would you do---skin your other knuckles?" inquired Danny Grin innocently.

"We're wasting too much time punishing a fellow who isn't here," Dick broke in. "Let's get forward. After another mile Dalzell and I will take the cart and get it over some of the ground. Now, forward, march!"

It was noticed that Dave Darrin walked with clenched-fists. Tom took long strides that carried him in advance of the others. Dick Prescott was mostly silent, yet in his eyes there was a steady light, and a grim look about his mouth, that bespoke the possibility of some inconvenience to Bert Dodge and his friend, should that pair fall into the hands of Dick & Co. within the next hour.

At noon Dick & Co. halted. Under the shade of a group of trees, close to a roadside spring, they built two small fires. Over one they made coffee; over the other, they fried bacon and eggs. This, with bread, constituted the meal. A brief rest, then on they went once more.

It was toward five o'clock when Dick and Tom, who knew the road from having tramped over it before, announced that they were less than half a mile from the point where they would turn in to go to the second lake.

At this time Greg and Dan were managing the push cart. Tom and Dick strode on ahead, watching for the first sign of the path that should lead down to their intended camp site.

Suddenly, however, Prescott seized Reade by the arm, halting him.

"What's the matter?" asked Tom.

"Sh!---" Dick piloted his friend in behind a line of bushes, then went cautiously ahead.

"Look over there!" whispered Dick.

Tom Reade gave a start when he found himself gazing at a red runabout that stood just off the road and apparently deserted.

"Humph! That's a Smattach, too," declared Tom. "It must be the Dodge car. Bert and Bayliss must be somewhere about."

Dick stood surveying the car with speculative eyes.

"I know what you're thinking about," Tom whispered. "Wait; I'll go back and halt the fellows and bring Dave forward with me."

In a few moments this had been done. Darry gazed at the red Smattach with gleaming eyes.

"This is surely our chance!" he muttered. "Now, what can we do?"

All three were silent for a few moments. Then Tom Reade smote his thigh with one hand.

"I have it," he muttered excitedly.

"Then don't be stingy with your secret," urged Dave. "Out with at least a part of it."

For some moments Dick, Dave and Tom remained engaged in a rapid interchange of whispers, all the time glancing about them. _

Read next: Chapter 4. Stalling The Red "Smattach"

Read previous: Chapter 2. Dodge And Bayliss Hear Something

Table of content of High School Boys' Fishing Trip


GO TO TOP OF SCREEN

Post your review
Your review will be placed after the table of content of this book